KINGSTON, Jamaica – Principal of Harmon’s Primary in Manchester, Georgia Waugh Richards, was yesterday declared the president-elect designate of the Jamaica Teachers’ Association (JTA) following a preliminary count.

Waugh Richards, who also contested the election in 2014, was one of three candidates vying for the position in the 2016 JTA president-elect elections held June 20-24, 2016. 

She received 6,089 of the 13,144 votes cast in the elections.

She defeated candidates Collington Powell, principal of Friendship Primary in St, Catherine, and Owen Speid, principal Russeau Primary in St Andrew, who received 3,254 votes and 3,250 votes, respectively.

The JTA said there were 551 rejected ballots.

Waugh Richards in 2014 lost her bid to lead the JTA after first being declared the winner in the president-elect poll, which subsequently showed that her opponent, Norman Allen, was the victor after a recount by the Electoral Office of Jamaica (EOJ).

The vote count by the EOJ showed that Allen, from Four Paths High, received 5,977 votes compared with 5,798 votes for Waugh Richards, reversing the preliminary count by the Standing Committee of the JTA’s General Council that had Waugh Richards winning by 83 votes – polling 6,079 to Allen’s 5,996.

Waugh Richards filed an injunction in the Supreme Court seeking to bar the JTA from installing Allen as president-elect.

However, she later discontinued her legal proceedings against the association.

The JTA said yesterday that the winner will be officially proclaimed at the official opening of its annual conference scheduled for the Hilton Rose Hall Resort and Spa, Montego Bay, St James from August 22-24, 2016.